Pie charts show 603 million Chinese netizens access the Internet for communications, followed by 524 million for searching information, 518 million for news feeds, 443 million for listening to music, and 440 for watching videos. [Charts: Xinhua]

A new report shows that the number of Chinese web users had climbed to 710 million by the end of June this year, ranking the first in the world for nine consecutive years and 3.1% higher than the world average, people.cn reports.

The report on the country's Internet development was released by the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) on Wednesday, August 3, 2016.

More Chinese netizens tend to access the Internet through mobile devices. China has 656 million mobile network users, which accounts for 92.5% of the total web surfers and 2.4% higher than in 2015.

The report also indicates that more people manage their wealth through the Internet. By the end of June, netizens who shop online and use online payment services amounted to 448 million and 455 million, respectively. Well over 100 million people had purchased online financial products during the first half of the year.

2016 has also seen a sharp increase of webcast service users. Webcast services for personal use became popular in the first half of 2016. By the end of June, the number of webcast users already amounted to 325 million, accounting for 45.8% of the total number of netizens.